Originally posted by BackFireMy only problem with the movie was that the actors (Elwes and Whannel especially) were so overdramatic that it was funny, not horrifying. Otherwise I thought it was excellent
....I hate the TCM remake.Anyways, here's what I wrote for my review of this film in the other thread.
"Sorry everyone, but bluntly, this movie was bad. It was sloppy, generic, predictable, and obviously amatuerish. It's no surprise that this film was the first from James Wan, it shows.
I'll go ahead and just skip the plot, simply read C-Dics summary of it if you don't already the plot. But I will say this, the story is not unlike the plot in Phone Booth. A bitter crazy guy wants his victims to apreciate life and blah blah blah. So, using very questionable logic, he tortures these people usually to death in order to get them to apreciate life.
Spoiler:
The biggest problem of this film was the simple stupidity of pretty much all of the characters. They were all stupid to the point of being mentally handicaped. Danny Glover and his partner are a perfect example of this. In the middle of the film when they had the chance to capture the guy immediately after seeing him walk into the room which they had snuck into after figuring out where he was hiding. Instead, they sat and watched him for about 10 seconds, letting him get situated and get near the man he had captured. Then when the guy turned on his drill of death, they ****ed around with him, asking him to turn it off, rather then just immediately shooting the machine to shut it down. It took these cops about 30 seconds to figure out that they should shoot the machine. By then it was too late and Danny Glover got his neck sliced by some hidden knife the bad guy had concealed that sprang out of teh arm of his jacket, not unlike the gun from Taxi Driver.Something else really dumb is that the bad guy (who is a god damn dying old man who in the end could barely walk) becomes superman when he attacks someone, moving faster and seemingly with more force then anyone else on the earth can contend with. He even managed to ambush Adam, when Adam knew where he was. Another example of using stupid character as an excuse for the success of the villian, something a lot of bad and sloppy movies do.
Another typical amatuerish move was to have the bad guy win at the end. I'm so sick of movies taking the easy way of leaving the audience in a sense of unsatisfaction and frusturation by simply having the bad guy win. A good movie will find a way to have the story feel unfair while still beign satisfying (for a good example of this, watch Se7en. The bad guy dies AND the movie still leaves us frusturated, but not cheated, as this movie does.
One last gripe, the "twist" at the end was really dumb. "oooooh, the dead body in the middle of the room is actually the killer." yeah, way to pull a cheasy gimmick twist out of your ass.
Okay, now to the positives. The movie had a good, grainy and dark feeling to it. Very atmospheric. Some good sets and props. Nifty, little wierd torture devices. That's about all of the positives.
Over all, this movie was very poor, and used the easiest device of leaving the audience frustruated, and unsatisfied, and ultimately, cheated. If you want a good psychological movie, watch Se7en, or Audition. Don't bother with this generic and pretentious movie.
I'll give it 4 our of 10."
Hi all - had to come on a forum - cos I just saw SAW. Loved it up to the ending and then was amazed after googling to find so mny reviews saying it was ingenious etc. I'm sorry, but if the orderly character was being usd agains his will why do we see him in front of the monitors waving at his fellow victims, why does he so maliciously play with his gun in order to frighten the woman and child etc. It does nOT MAKe SENSE - it would hae worked perfectly if he had not been shown at the monitors and the killer was not in the room or if they were working together.
highly implausible.
Veteran cop versus Hospital orderly (orderly wins)
Tumour bloke gets shotgunned in back andgets up and walks away.
How does he remain still so long?
but the major one - if orederly is under duress why is he enjoying it so much. Hate bad endings - ruined a good flick. Can anybody explain it so it makes sense and i can enjoy the film?
Saw
BF I cant find the original thread for this movie (search feature doesn't work with only 3 letters).
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Wow, what a piece of crap.
I've heard how wonderful and original and suspenseful the movie is and how the ending will shock you.
No no no and no.
The story is lame and tiring, horrible acting and screenplay, tons of holes and enormous improbabilities.
There wasn't even any gore! Horrible!
What was Danny Glover doing in this crap fest? His character was so insanely preposterous its laughable.
I just love how
Spoiler:
Saw some how knew the exact day Danny Glover would discover his location through watching the graffiti on the videotape and listening for a fire alarm in order so that he could strap himself to a drill chair and put on a fake charade to confuse us, the audience! 🙄
Horrible movie. 👇
Eh, I re-rented it this afternoon, at a discounted price thankfully, and as Backfire suggested, it was WORSE the second time around. I found it literally impossible to enjoy about 1/2 way into it, then it just started to unravel.
I mean, they more or less give away the killer/accomplice a few times before the movie is half way done even! Then they try to make you think it was someone else, when anyone who's watching knows damn well it wasn't
Spoiler:.
Danny Glover
There were A LOT of things that really bothered me the second time around.
Spoiler:
Jigsaw, who was laying in the middle of the floor, conveniently didn't have to breathe that entire time? If he did, he supposedly went unnoticed?
Spoiler:
Is it me, or is it convenient that a man with an inoperable frontal lobe tumor can A) "just slip out" of a hospital undetected. Don't suggest the orderly helped him, I doubt he had security clearance and B) shows no signs of A TUMOR THAT WOULD BE BULDGING OUT OF HIS ****ING FOREHEAD!?
Spoiler:
Why were Danny Glover and his Asian sidekick just STANDING THERE as that drill press device was running, and they had Jigsaw cornered, letting him go!?! Shoot the ****er, or don't use that scene in the movie. It's insulting, and makes no sense.
Spoiler:
When Danny Glover had his throat slashed, that was totally uncredible. Not only would that have severed his vocal cords, he would have choked to death on his own blood almost instantaneously.
Spoiler:
That "other guy" in the lavatory with pansy assed Cary Elwes, when he was pretending to be dying from the arsenic(?) laced cigarette. That was just..embarassing...to watch, and honestly assume that the writer/director thought it was credible.
Cary Elwes. Christ on a cracker, was he out of place. He goes from trying his best to sound intimidating, then turning to mush with his daughter on the phone. He has no range, and if he did, it was contrived. The end, when he was forced to
Spoiler:, I was ROLLLLLLINNNNNGGGGGGG! It sounded more like he was at a sperm bank, looking to make a donation, but can't get it up. All this horribly forced moaning and groaning and ridiculous faces, while that other guy is selling his "Oh my God!" routine, which couldn't have been less believable. I'll say it right now. Cary Elwes is a horrid actor.
saw off his foot
Danny Glover. Just..he's lost it. He sounded as if he had just learned to read, and was reciting his lines from cue cards, after thinking about how to deliver them after 5 minutes.
I could go on, but I've more than made my point...